FRUSTRATION is building after councillors were left in the dark over key issues regarding a major road scheme in Ringwood, according to the town’s mayor.

Members of Ringwood Town Council were still searching for answers after a recent meeting with officials from Highways England.

The national road network authority is scheduled to begin a major improvement scheme on the westbound carriageway from 2021.

The project was initially due to commence next year but has been delayed.

As reported by the Daily Echo, the start date was pushed back to avoid a clash with works on the A338.

While the multi-million pound scheme is still three years away, Ringwood’s mayor Tim Ward admitted a lack of clarity on certain issues surrounding the project had frustrated members.

Cllr Ward, who attended the meeting with Highways England last month, said: “We can’t even get started on asking about the detail of the project. I don’t think they have worked it out themselves yet.

“I asked about a number of issues we raised at town council meetings, but was provided with no straight answers.

“This is going to cause major disruption in the town and we need to be able to plan to mitigate against it, but if they cannot provide us with the details we can’t plan. At this stage we aren’t getting answers or a direction from Highways England.”

Cllr Ward said he stressed a diversion route would cause problems in the town and suggested other measures such as contraflow, which Highways England said they would explore.

However, the authority warned road closures could be unavoidable to replace bridges.

Highways England stated that the preliminary design should be frozen in July and completed by October. A statutory public consultation would follow running until early 2020.

A detailed design phase will then take place, before the current provisional start date of March 2021.

Further meetings have been scheduled for July and November this year.